In fact, the work which we possess under the name of Scylax, is evidently a collection of the itineraries of ancient navigators:  it may have been drawn up by the Scylax whom Darius employed, though, if that were the case, it is very extraordinary he should not have included the journal of his own voyage; or his name, as that of a celebrated geographer may have been put to it; or there may have been another geographer of that name.  The collection is evidently imperfect; what is extant contains the coasts of the Palus Maeotis, the Euxine, the Archipelago, the Adriatic, and all the Mediterranean, with the west coast of Africa, as far as the isle of Cerne, which he asserts to be the limit of the Carthaginian navigation and commerce in that direction.  The sea, according to him, is not navigable further to the south than this island, on account of the thick weeds with which it was covered.  The mention of this impediment is adduced by D’Anville to prove the reality of the Carthaginian voyages to the south:  it is not, indeed, true, that the sea is impassable on account of these weeds to modern navigators, but it is easy to conceive that the timidity and inexperience of the ancients, as well as the imperfect construction of their vessels, would prevent them from proceeding further south, when they met with such a singular obstacle.  If a ship has not much way through the water, these weeds will impede her course.  It has been very justly remarked, that if the latitude where these weeds commence was accurately determined, it would fix exactly the extent of the voyages of the Carthaginians in this direction.  The weed alluded to is probably the fucus natans, or gulf-weed.

Hitherto the knowledge that the ancients possessed of the habitable world, had not been collected by any writer, and is to be gathered entirely from short, vague, and evidently imperfect narrations, scattered throughout a great number of authors.  Herodotus has been celebrated as the father of history; he may with equal justice be styled the father of geographical knowledge:  he flourished about 474 years before Christ.  In dwelling upon the advances to geographical knowledge which have been derived from him, it will be proper and satisfactory, before we explain the extent and nature of them, to give an account of the sources from which he derived his information; those were his own travels, and the narrations or journals of other travellers.  A great portion of the vigour of his life seems to have been spent in travelling; the oppressive tyranny of Lygdamis over Halicarnassus, his native country, first induced or compelled him to travel; whether he had not also imbibed a portion of the commercial activity and enterprize which distinguished his countrymen, is not known, but is highly probable.  We are not informed whether his fortune were such as to enable him, without entering into commercial speculations, to support the expences of his travels; it is evident, however, from the extent of his travels,